I'll spend more time addressing your points for the same reason I did previously. Those not bothered please skip.



Please don't accuse me of something I have stated is not what I said and is certainly not what I meant. What part of "I yield to no-one..." is hard to understand? Yet we enjoyed the success we did because we had the best team in the competition - nearly all internationals for one spell. How did we do that We bought in talent and ability. Bought in rather than developed in-house, in the main, although we WERE very successful at bringing in players with great potential. In those days we clearly had the money to do that. Or the means to secure outside funding for players. Like most clubs who are serially successful in most sports, we were able to buy success. And that includes coaching staff! I am sure Noble cost much more than McNamara, for example. We were able to pay for talent there too! And in the support functions. BUT we were buying that success - for heaven's sake surely even the most ardent Noble admirer would not claim that it was only Noble's coaching that made the difference? And not money?

As for your introduction of the term "corruption", well that is twice now in one paragraph that you have sought to defame me. I neither said nor implied any such thing.



I already mentioned one of the things I had heard, re Noble, and I explained another - regarding where I judged his skill set to be. I have heard a number of other things (not re Noble) that I cannot debate on here either without clear proof or because no good would be done by it. Including regarding the Harris debacle. And re Fielden, conventional wisdom is that he he left because he no longer wanted to play for us and was attracted by a lot more money. I have long felt this could be less than fair to Fielden, since I have strong suspicions (shall we say?) that the club needed the cash, and quickly. But, as I said, we will likely have to await the autobiographies, since (for my own part at least) I have not been able to get to the bottom of all that went on in that few weeks, and I some of my own guesses could well be wide of the mark.



Hold on. The board gave him that contract 2 1/2 years before you say he should have been sacked. The awarding of the contract was a judgment call by the board, that that with hindsight looked to have proved a poor one. And the board may well have worked that out after 2 1/2 years. But that is something totally different to my point, which is that - (assuming) having recognised 2 1/2 years later that you got the call wrong, where was the money to come from to pay him off? Your point relies on the benefit of hindsight; mine just a recognition of what I believe were commercial realities. You again seem to be choosing to read far more into what I said (or did not say) than is there.



Someone who I regard as a totally fair and reasonable poster has already pointed out my memory failure here. I actually mentioned Ferres because your post read as if we had signed him as well as Solomona! But, having cleared that up, I was actually being critical of the club for letting a potentially talented youngster go! As indeed I made pretty clear elsewhere that I was regarding all the other young backs we have failed to retain. Regardless of fault. And indeed, was it not widely reported that Caisley offered Langley and Reardon to Wakey for Ellis, behind Noble's back, and Noble had to undo the damage that caused when he returned? The point I was trying to make was that losing young talent has not been the preserve just of the post-Caisley administration.



I'll leave it to the archivists on here to dig out the media articles - and the transcript from the fans forum at which IIRC it was first stated

You may have no doubt, but I suspect most reasonable observers would expect Sam to have done what he did regardless of club. The opportuniy hte had was simply too good to turn down IMO. In support of this, if you were correct how come we have not heard Sam slagging off Bradford since he went? Either officially or through the twittersphere or whatever?



I have to be careful with what I say here. Suffice it to say that to suggest that any confidentiality clause (you seem to know of one) in in Orford's release was put there solely to fool the fans is deluded IMO. For reasons I most definitely cannot go into - and that includes information that did NOT come from the club - I am quite satisfied that the club played hardball for as long as it could, but in the end took the only sensible decision for totally pragmatic and prudent reasons.



In that, you are therefore calling Hood a liar. Because he stated categorically in the media that the club would welcome a big outside investor, and that he was more than happy to pass over the (then) acting chairmanship. I have taken what Hood said at face value, you believe he lied. Only Hood and his colleagues know which of us is right.

And, for that matter, did Caisley himself not openly solicit an offer for his shares and outside investment?



Another of these irregular verbs, is it? "I express an opinion; you talk paranoid nonsense"? I have been careful not to accuse you of talking nonsense of any kind - strangely enough, even if I strongly disagree with you if its a view you hold then to dismiss it as nonsense is conceited at best.

You don't have to have met someone to be in their camp. I am regularly very close in views to one camp or another in matters of current affairs - even though I never met any of the participants. And indeed, I was a very strong supporter of Caisley myself (attracting no end of flak on internet forums for my sins) until some things came to light that left me feeling badly let down. I HAVE met Caisley btw, and been in formal meetings with him.



That was because, as I explained, rightly or wrongly I have attributed most of the the more recent problems to the severe financial constraints inherited. I have seen for myself Hood Duckett and Duffy working their balls off over recent years to try and keep the ship afloat. The contributions of those directors now retired from the Board I cannot speak for. What with hindsight appears to have been much the biggest mistake - not addressing the coaching issue far sooner - I have already expressed my views on. But bear in mind a well-received change of head coach seems to have made little difference so far - maybe we should attack the board again with hindsight?

I have already been critical of allowing promising youngsters to leave - but again I attribute much of that to financial constraints. And I think with some justification.



By which you mean that is what YOU are suggesting? Indeed, sometimes I will try and relay things as best I can I have been told or have learnt - as do others on here that club officials deem it OK to talk to. And if I say something that is way wrong on here, it is not unknown for a club official to put me right - sometimes quite unequivocally.

But most of what I have said is from my own observations or reflects the views I formed from all the different sources of information - especially matters financial where any skilled reader of a set of accounts would reach the same conclusions that I did. Other than at the fans forum, I have spoken or had email exchanges with club officials on at best a couple of of occasions this year.

Where I DO tend to pile in is where I believe - sometimes I know, but more often I believe - injustice is being done. And in doing so I risk my own credibility - with the club as well as with other readers - if I get it badly wrong. That is why I only express opinions on off-field matters when I I believe I know or have deduced enough of the facts to avoid doing so.

Anyone who knows me will attest that I am far too independently-minded and bolshy to be anyone's unthinking mouthpiece. And that if I ever find I have been lied to, then the trust is gone forever.

spot on Adeybull, and congratulations on not getting fed up with having to focus on raking up history rather than focusing on the future and how we get back to where we can and should be, step by step by step. The first one of which is to win the next three SL games. It should be apparent then who in the squad wants to put a full shift in on the pitch, and who needs moving on.

On the financial front, as it clearly is such an important aspect of recent history, if anybody has a set of the accounts over the last few years I will happily do a detailed analysis of them and publish my findings as a thread. the last seven or eight years worth should do it but as many as possible will do

See PM.

I think the term 'bought' would be viewed as a pejorative in any defamation case despite your attempted explanation.

I never accused Peter Hood of being a liar although you make a strong case for such a charge. According to your analysis the board didn't sack SM because they couldn't afford to pay the two years of his contract that sacking him would have demanded 2 1/2 years into his 4 1/2 year contract.However, during 2009 and even in early 2010 Peter Hood publicly backed SM and even stated that he would be offering SM an extension prior to SM accepting the England job. These are mutually exclusive positions you suggest Peter Hood occupied. Personally, I don't think Peter Hood lied. I don't believe they considered sacking him at all. In fact they backed his judgement with many further signings and this deserves to be called a profound error.

On the further point of 'sugar daddy' I refute the suggestion I called Peter Hood a liar. If I have a wheelbarrow for sale for £1million I still have a wheelbarrow for sale. That we haven't attracted an investor/buyer when clubs with fractions of our support base and success do attract such, is inexplicable and whether investors have been notionally sought or bids solicited is immaterial.

I'm pretty certain I've told you previously I had no associations with 'camps' or 'agendas' as you occasionally call dissenting views.

I accept the financial situation inherited by BOD was very poor with mounting losses. That it has been used as an explanation of every single poor decision since is, in my view, misleading and it is this I was seeking to correct in your original post.

Do top soccer clubs"buy" success by recruiting the best - and usually therefore amongst the most expensive - talent available? Of course they do. Did the Bulls "buy" success by doing likewise? If you look down the teamsheets of the early noughties, I suggest most people would say the same?

Indeed, that is exactly what many DID say - I recall any number of forum arguments with fans of other clubs who accused us of doing precisely that rather than developing our own talent. After we got past Pryce Fielden and Deacon we sort of ran out of players to counter the argument with, although we made at least a case for bringing in overseas players like Withers and Hape who whilst doubtless expensive at the time were "finds" when on cheaper packages.

It wasn't me who said the board wanted to sack Macca earlier but could not. I used your timings, and repeated what I said for much of that period at the time to those who wanted him sacked -to sack him could prove prohibitively expensive. I also said at the time that to recruit a (overseas) replacememt of the kind whose names were being bandied about by fans could likewise prove prohibitively expensive. And the two together possibly ruinous.

Hood never, IIRC, said specifically he would be offering Macca an extension? Indeed, according to Connor it was the fact that the club had NOT discussed extended terms with him that put us at serious risk (yes, he actually said and felt that at the time!) of losing him. It seemed pretty apparent to many of us at the time that the board were divided on the issue. And I Do know, from discussion and as I said earlier, that by the end the board had certainly realised that we had been spending a lot of money on some mediocre signings. I won't repeat on here specifics, but one or two others reading this will know what I refer to since they were there. I think there is now an understanding there that the coaching decision was proved a mistake, but also that it was not all Macca's fault.

But - and I come back to my original point! - I believe the decision to appoint a relatively inexperienced Macca instead of making an offer he could not refuse to an expensive antipodean was almost certainly driven by money. I am sure that, had the finances not been going into meltdown, once such would have been sought. So again - whilst it is quite clear to most people now, with hindsight, that the board made the wrong decision, I remain unmoved from my original assertion that the causative factor was lack of money! Which, again is why I cited that as the fundamental reason we fell from grace. Appointing a head coach who, in the event, did not seem up to the job was a symptom - albeit a pretty big one - not the cause.

And I have spent heaven knows how long now trying to get across why I said what I did in a simplistic post written in haste in the small hours to try and answer a question in as simple terms as I could! If you want to debate the definitions and attributions of symptoms and causes further, it won't be with me.

You said that in your opinion the club was not, and never had been, up for sale. I said that contradicted what Hood said publically. You have now changed your stance to argue (I think) that the club cannot have been up for sale because we never attracted a buyer??? I'll let the readers be the judge of that. And no, you did not expressly call Hood a liar - but what you said made it clear you believed him to be.

In fact, I will now qualify it with something I am surprised you did not throw back at me. In fact, technically and if being pedantic, you were right. What Hood asked for IIRC was someone to step in with a major investment. That MAY have led to an acquisition of a majority shareholding - and therefore the sale of the club by the selling shareholders - but it need not necessarily have done. Remember Hood is chair yet has only a small percentage of the shares, and an incoming investor need not necessarily have become the majority owner - although I think most folk would expect that to be the case. But anyway, its academic because - for whatever reason - the big benefactor did not appear.

On your last point -in fact I can't argue with that, and nor could any reasonable person. To seek to blame EVERY bad decision on the financial situation - directly or indirectly - is clearly not just misleading but absurd. And I have not sought to do so! And had you begun your original rebuttal of my post with those words, maybe we'd not have had such need to enter into War and Peace on here over it!

But I attributed the biggest of the wrong decisions (although pursuing the OSV may yet prove - again with hindsight - to be another such) primarily to the financial situation - although only the participants know the truth or otherwise in this. And used it to help explain the restrictions which affected some of the other decisions taken, such as losing the academy products, a point which in fact I first introduced. And that - again - was the reason I did not list what I saw as symptoms not causes in my original post that you took such exception to. And I stand by that.

And, since I am sure anyone who has made it this far must be bored to tears by now, I'll leave it at that and for to you to have the last word should you wish.

Quite a few arguements ongoing within this thread however I think the title of the thread has it pretty accurate. We probably are the worst team in the comp, and have been since midway through last season.

Regardless of the circumstances around our decline over the past 6 years, we are a club who supposedly has access to the full salary cap, is coached by a (supposedly) good coach, and are watched by sizeable average crowds. Compare our performances to those of Wakefield, a club who have been in abolute turmoil for the past 6 months, who are reliant on loan players from other clubs, who are spending way less than the salary cap, and who without a4 point deduction would be sat above us in the league table, there really is no excuse to be performing the way we are.

Very good point.

The way Wakey have got over their adversity should be an example to our players.

If ever there was an irrefutable argument, that is it.

And now the table proves it!!!

Quite perceptive all those weeks ago wasn't I - wake up jack as*es and smell the coffee our team stinks and the Chairman needs to sort out this mess NOW!!

No, your perception is as bad as your memory, you said that the coach and the chairman "had to go", so how come you now believe he can sort the mess?

Do you think we would be playing any better with a third coach? Why?

As for the general point, your OP was 1st May, at which stage we were a candidate for worst team in the comp in [ianyone's[/i book, and if we maintain our current form we will be, no clairvoyance needed, so no cigar for you. As for the table, the table at halfway 'proves' nothing. If it did, they'd be presenting the pots tomorrow, but I don't believe they are.

FA I love your deluded view of our current predicament!

I am not worthy of your wisdom

And what do you suggest he does to sort this out?

I do note you've avoided actually answering FA who's already asked you this question and instead have just posted an attempt at abuse.

im really worried about the club from top to bottom

even our reserve and junior teams seem to be in turmoil!

i think every supporter would be happy if our players "appeared to try and give a toss" .. however .. maybe its hard for the guys who are only on one year contracts as perhaps they know they are on their way out!

think we'd all be happy to lose but only concede 24 points! ..

However Barry Eaton did make me laugh today by suggesting if we had to go out and get someone .. it should be a british forward?

it would help if the coach and the chairman .. came out and said it like it is .. rather than media Bullrubbish ...

we want passion and commitment top to bottom!